Move Over ‘Family Guy,’ Now ‘Smiling Friends’ is Sorta Beefing With ‘The Simpsons’

The Simpsons has had its fair share of public feuds over the years, from that beef with George H.W. Bush to its long-running rivalry with Family Guy. The latter famously found Matt Groening’s show repeatedly poking fun at the Seth Macfarlane cartoon’s more familiar elements and Family Guy responding with “jokes” involving animated sexual assault and murder.

Well, now The Simpsons is embroiled in a back-and-forth cartoon battle with yet another popular show: Smiling Friends.

As we mentioned back in May, season 36 of The Simpsons ended with “Estranger Things,” an episode all about Bart and Lisa tiring of The Itchy & Scratchy Show. To fill the void left behind by the ultraviolent cat and mouse characters, Bart turns his attention to a brand new animated series: Screaming Friends.

Obviously Screaming Friends was intended as a parody of Smiling Friends, the darkly absurd Adult Swim show created by Michael Cusack and Zach Hadel. But a number of its fans weren’t exactly thrilled that the nearly four decade-old Simpsons franchise – which was once considered edgy and subversive itself –was suddenly making fun of the new cartoon on the block while wildly misrepresenting its tone. 

Well, now Smiling Friends has fired back at The Simpsons. 

The most recent episode, “Squirm Returns,” begins with Pim watching a show that is much like The Simpsons, except the characters are all green. When the Marge stand-in asks the Bart parody what he’s doing on that “confounded computer tablet device,” he responds “Hawk Tuah, man!” The giant green Homer then mumbles “Mmm boy,” and then eats the fake Bart. Oh, and the green Lisa stands silently on the sidelines holding an anti-fascist sign. 

“After 487 seasons they’ve still got it,” Pim remarks. 

Some fans have suggested that the two shows are now officially at war with one another!

Of course, the “war” doesn’t seem to be very mean-spirited. Both Hadel and Cusack have credited The Simpsons as an early inspiration on their comedic sensibilities. And in a recent interview with USA Today, Cusack said that seeing Smiling Friends parodied on the long-running animated series was “one of the most surreal moments of my life.” Hadel stressed that it was “one of the weirdest things ever. It was very cool. It's an honor.”

And while Smiling Friends did get in a pointed jab about the show being arguably past its prime, at least they didn’t resort to making Simpsons characters the victims of horrific crimes.